American Vintage series used prices

adam1990

crunchman said:

The American Original is the successor to the AVRI series.  That's around £1500 new if you shop around.  That puts an AVRI in the £1000 kind of price range second hand.  Some people like older ones, so the market might support £100 extra for one that's 20 years old.  The older one won't inherently be a better guitar than a 6 month old American Original though.

You're not wrong at all! My AO 60's is the best Tele I have played so far. (Light weight and very resonant) I managed to pick it up on ebay last year for £800, this is why I find it odd that some sellers listing AVRI series guitars at well above a brand new AO price.

francer

crunchman said:

The American Original is the successor to the AVRI series.  That's around £1500 new if you shop around.  That puts an AVRI in the £1000 kind of price range second hand.  Some people like older ones, so the market might support £100 extra for one that's 20 years old.  The older one won't inherently be a better guitar than a 6 month old American Original though.

Well strictly speaking the AO series superseded the AV series which superseded the AVRI series.

Taking the jazzmaster and Jaguars as examples we have

AVRI 1999 - 2012 based on 62 models, slim necks 7.25 rad
AV 2012 - 2018 based on 65 models, bound chunkier necks, 7.25 rad
AO 2018 - present, as AV but different nitro, 9.5 rad

they obviously did a similar thing with the  strats and teles but I don’t know all the spec details to post them here.

For the AV series Fender made a lot of play about them being their most vintage accurate models based original 65 guitars tooling and pick up voicings etc. And I think it’s widely accepted that they’re a step up from the AVRI models, at least by Fender to justify the price hike. I have one or two of the AV offsets and they’re great, as good as I can imagine a guitar to be.

crunchman

francer said:

crunchman said:

The American Original is the successor to the AVRI series.  That's around £1500 new if you shop around.  That puts an AVRI in the £1000 kind of price range second hand.  Some people like older ones, so the market might support £100 extra for one that's 20 years old.  The older one won't inherently be a better guitar than a 6 month old American Original though.

Well strictly speaking the AO series superseded the AV series which superseded the AVRI series.

Taking the jazzmaster and Jaguars as examples we have

AVRI 1999 - 2012 based on 62 models, slim necks 7.25 rad
AV 2012 - 2018 based on 65 models, bound chunkier necks, 7.25 rad
AO 2018 - present, as AV but different nitro, 9.5 rad

they obviously did a similar thing with the  strats and teles but I don’t know all the spec details to post them here.

For the AV series Fender made a lot of play about them being their most vintage accurate models based original 65 guitars tooling and pick up voicings etc. And I think it’s widely accepted that they’re a step up from the AVRI models, at least by Fender to justify the price hike. I have one or two of the AV offsets and they’re great, as good as I can imagine a guitar to be.

The AVs aren't inherently better than the AVRIs.  I think the Strats had better stock pickups - the 57/62s in the older Strats aren't great.  Pickups can easily be changed though.  The 2012 to 2018 models had the thin finish that marks very easily.  I don't think that's a fundamental difference though.  Neither of them have thick poly gloop.

francer

crunchman said:

francer said:

For the AV series Fender made a lot of play about them being their most vintage accurate models based original 65 guitars tooling and pick up voicings etc. And I think it’s widely accepted that they’re a step up from the AVRI models, a

The AVs aren't inherently better than the AVRIs.  I think the Strats had better stock pickups - the 57/62s in the older Strats aren't great.  Pickups can easily be changed though.  The 2012 to 2018 models had the thin finish that marks very easily.  I don't think that's a fundamental difference though.  Neither of them have thick poly gloop.

I’ll concede it’s a moot point and both ranges are fairly equivalent USA made instruments.

I can only speak for Jazzmasters and as far as I can tell the spec improvements between AVRI and AV amounted to bone nuts, pearl fret dots, different shielding, an angled neck pocket (reducing the need for a shim) and that super fragile authentic 60s nitro finish that does indeed ding and check very easily, so agreed, not much to differentiate them there.

However, anecdotally I can say that AVRI JMs tend to run a little heavier, over 8lbs as opposed to just under for most AVs (based on far too much time surfing the web looking at used guitar ads) - see also, impmanns comment above, coincidentally a guitar I nearly made him an offer for, but luckily a bargain AV65 Jag came up near where I live so looks like I dodged a bullet there!

Over the years I’ve bought two AVRI necks for projects and both had maxed out truss rods.

I agree none of this makes one range inherently better than the other, and I still gas for an AVRI JM occasionally, in fact the guy I bought the Jag off has a lovely lightweight OTM AVRI 62 Jazzmaster that I’d own in a heartbeat but generally I wouldn’t buy one unseen.

YMMV.

crunchman

Weight and quality of wood probably vary over such a long run.  I've got a 2001 AVRI 62 reissue that's a nice weight, and sounds stunning.  Like I said above, the stock pickups weren't great, but I've had Fralins in there for well over a decade.  The pickups were probably the significant difference on the later ones.